


Too Far

by SophiaCatherine



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Lewis Snart's A+ Parenting, M/M, Mick Rory expresses love through food, Past Child Abuse, Running Away, the Snibs can't do feelings, young coldwave
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:33:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26177269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SophiaCatherine/pseuds/SophiaCatherine
Summary: A teenage Lisa Snart runs away after an argument with her brother.“It’s been hours. Her backpack is missing too.” Len takes a deep breath. “What if she’s run away?”Mick half-turns his head to size Len up. “What did you do?”Turns out, that’s the wrong thing to say.
Relationships: Leonard Snart & Lisa Snart, Mick Rory & Lisa Snart, Mick Rory/Leonard Snart
Comments: 19
Kudos: 96





	Too Far

**Author's Note:**

  * For [blueelvewithwings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueelvewithwings/gifts).



> For blueelvewithwings' birthday I wanted to write a nice ‘young coldwave’ fic with a Lisa focus... and then my hand slipped, and runaway teen!Lisa domestic angst resulted. Happy birthday blueelevewithwings (posted a bit early so you have time to enjoy it)! And thank you for beta reading ridiculous numbers of my words this year. <3

“Lisa’s gone.”

Mick is elbow-deep in soapy water when he hears that oh-so-familiar panic in his partner’s voice. For a minute, he’s too busy to process what Len’s just said. It’s not like anyone else ever does the dishes around here. The Snarts are obsessive fuckers about keeping the rest of the house clean, but they turn tail and run from anything that goes on in the kitchen - dirty dishes, cooking, all of it. For years they didn’t even really like _eating,_ something Mick never knew was possible, before he met them. Now that he knows them both better, he figures that was probably Lewis Snart’s fault. Just one more reason Mick would deck the guy if he ever met him. (He’s been keeping a list.)

“Gone where?” Mick attacks the next plate with the scrubbing brush, scowling at the caked-on mac and cheese, the kind that comes out of a box. Mick does keep pointing out Lisa’s fourteen and capable of eating solid food now, but it hasn’t helped yet.

Behind him, Len sucks in a breath through his teeth, always a sign he’s testy. “I don’t know, Mick,” he practically growls. “If I knew that, I’d have said she was _out,_ not gone.” 

Mick rolls his eyes to the grubby ceiling, forgetting that Len is standing behind him and can’t see it. “Calm your tits - I get the idea. When d’you last see her?”

“It’s been hours. Her backpack is missing too.” Len takes a deep breath. “What if she’s run away?”

Mick half-turns his head to size Len up. “What did you do?”

Turns out, that’s the wrong thing to say.

* * *

Mick spends the next four hours calming Len down. Lisa’s quick to get pissed off and shut people out - a Snart family trait - but she gets over it. She’s only been gone a few hours, he tells Len. She might have just fucked off for a walk. She’ll be back by nightfall. 

She’s not back by nightfall.

“She’s probably just out with friends,” Mick tries, a last-ditch attempt.

Len doesn’t turn away from the window. “Already called Sasha and Justin. They’re fourteen, so there’s a good chance they’re lying, but…” He keeps his eyes fixed on his own reflection, solid against the well-lit room. Beyond the third-floor window, the Central City slums are an insubstantial shadow.

Mick waits to hear the plan. 

Two hours later, Mick figures he’s going to have to _make_ the plan. He joins his partner at the window, gazing down onto the lethal streets that disappear into the darkness. Mick lived on those streets, when he was no older than Lisa is now—survived them. And now the kid who’s like a sister to him is surviving somewhere in that wasteland. She might be growing into a badass, but she’s still only fourteen.

“Hey.” He clicks his fingers by Len’s ear. “Hey!” 

Len flinches and blinks groggy eyes. He looks terrible. “What?”

Mick folds his arms, hard armor across his chest. “You ever gonna go and look for her?”

It takes a minute, but Len nods. “Yeah,” he murmurs. “Okay.”

They start with people they know—small-time crews. Lisa’s been around Len’s crews for most of her life, and everyone knows everyone in their world. Paddy from the Danville crew is sympathetic, but not a lot of use. “Kids run off,” he says, on the poorly-lit corner of 132nd and Park Street, into his bike engine, “She’ll come back. Or she won’t, if she don’t want to. Rory, pass me that wrench.” 

They move on to the gangs, warier now. Alliances and rivalries are less clear in this corner of the criminal underworld, and Len’s reputation means not everyone’s inclined to be friendly. With every _sorry,_ _haven’t seen her_ , more fear creeps into Len’s face, and the more unsettled Mick gets to see it there. He’s used to his partner being unflappable in a crisis. But this isn’t a job gone wrong or a safe house raided by the cops. This is Lisa.

They keep going, across the city. The park is nothing but drug dealers who won’t talk to them, and their clients, who can’t. It just means dread deepening in Len’s eyes and no useful information after an hour. By the time they hit the bus station, Len is threatening uncooperative ticket sellers. Mick has to drag him away before they call the fucking cops. 

It’s Len who finally suggests the one idea Mick’s been hoping he won’t, through tightly clenched teeth. “Lewis.” 

The ride to Len’s old neighbourhood is too short - it makes Mick wish he’d been able to persuade Len to get Lisa out of dodge a long time ago. But neither of them ever liked the thought of having to start again in a new city, on someone else’s turf, and no contacts to build a new crew.

As Len gets off his bike, the brewing rage behind his eyes is even enough to make Mick wary. He hangs back as his partner approaches his old house, stopping across the street to wait for signs of Lewis - or Lisa. But there’s no one home. The place looks lived-in enough, but there are no lights on. 

“Might mean Lewis has moved. Might just mean he’s out,” Len muses, tapping the wall he’s leaning on. “Or he’s given in to alcoholism and failure just enough to get the electric turned off,” he adds, in the casual tone he always uses when he blurts out this shit. 

Mick stays quiet. It’s usually best not to interrupt Len’s cold rage where his father’s concerned.

“Hey.” Len waves five bucks at a kid peddling slowly past on a push-bike. “You seen a teenage girl in that house opposite? Or heard anything weird going on there?”

The kid shakes his head. “Nope. It’s only that mean old drunk lives there.” He grabs for the money. “You gonna give me that or what, mister?” 

Len holds it just out of the kid’s reach. “Keep watching the place, and this time tomorrow I’ll come back with another ten if I like what you’ve got to say about it.”

The kids eyes light up as he catches the money, before riding off. Mick tilts a head at Len, half impressed, half concerned. “Kids as intel. What’s next? Gonna recruit the local cats as drivers?”

“Kids see everything, and no one notices them.” In a flat tone, he adds, “Trust me - I know." Len's got one hand on his motorcycle, staring away in the direction of the docks. "There’s still the Waterfront gang to check out.”

They’re not gonna find her there, but Mick doesn’t argue.

Three hours and four city districts later, Len kicks an apartment block wall so hard it leaves him wincing. “This is a bust,” he snarls.

“Yeah.” They’ve hit the river now. Mick’s eyes are on the nice suburb of Lawrence Hills, just over the bridge. Lisa should know to steer clear of there, where any curtain-twitching old biddy could report a stranger walking at night, especially a teen who looks like she’s from the slums. Unless Lisa’s so pissed off she’s not thinking right. But Mick doesn’t want to imagine the kind of trouble she could be in then.

Len is pulling his bike helmet back on, and suddenly Mick is done with this shit. If Len keeps wearing himself out, he’ll be no use to anyone. He lays a firm hand on his partner’s back, turning him around. “She ain’t here, Lenny. Or if she is, we ain’t finding her tonight. C’mon.”

A silent Len nods, and lets Mick lead him home.

* * *

It’s four in the morning when Mick stumbles out of an empty bed to find his predictable partner sitting in his spot on the fire escape, staring out over the city. Probably means he wants to be found.

Mick grabs two beers from the fridge, pressing one into Len’s hands. “We’ll find her.” He drops to the rough metal floor, squeezing into the tiny space beside Len. “If she’s not back in the morning, we’ll…”

“We’ll _what,_ Mick?” Len turns his head, but there’s none of the usual power in his glare - just bags under his gaunt eyes. “You know we can’t call the cops.”

Right. Even if the both of them didn’t have open arrest warrants, Len doesn’t have custody of Lisa. Lewis barely tolerates her living here as it is. One visit from the cops could put an end to this arrangement. 

Just below them, an obvious smell draws Mick’s eyes to two teenagers smoking pot on the low wall of the apartment block. Somewhere in the distance, he thinks he can hear screaming. But maybe it’s just a couple of alley cats.

Len sighs. Mick hasn’t heard him sound this weary in a long time. Maybe not since he and Lisa were living with the aforementioned asshole. “Guess I’ll call her friends again tomorrow. Someone must know where she is.” A little more of that fear creeps into his eyes. It’s still freaking Mick out. “Lewis could have run with her.”

Mick shakes his head. “No.” When Len turns to raise an eyebrow at him, Mick says, “What, you don’t think he’d be using her against you the minute he had her?” 

Len tips his head sideways, slumping against the railings. “Maybe…”

“No, not maybe, Len. He’d be lording it over you.” God, his partner’s a stubborn fool when it comes to this subject. Doesn’t matter what shit his father pulls, there’s always something in him that never quite sees how bad it gets. But Mick could tell Len was afraid for Lisa’s life, and maybe even his own, when they fled here a few years ago. A few stern talks from Mick later, they stumbled into this arrangement, where Lewis is happy enough not to have to feed Lisa that he stays off Len’s back. 

Mick doesn’t know when it happened, but now there’s nothing he wouldn’t do to keep the two of them safe. 

He takes a glug from his beer. “Gonna tell me what happened yet?”

Len’s gaze is fixed on the dark city sprawling out beneath their feet. “This morning she asked if she could go on a trip. The skating school is taking some of the kids to Europe. I said it was an unnecessary risk.”

Mick rolls his eyes to the night sky. “Lemme guess - she got pissed, and you started doing that cold silent thing you do, and that pissed her off more.”

His partner shrugs, but that might be guilt in his eyes. A rare sight. “Pretty much,” Len says. “And then…” He scratches the heel of his boot in the dusty metal beneath him. “You know how she slings ‘You’re not Dad’ around, whenever she wants to get a rise out of me? This time she said I might as well be Lewis, for all the difference there is between us.”

Mick whistles. “Damn, Lise. There’s cold, and there’s _that.”_

But it’s self-recrimination on Len’s face, not anger, as he sits there tearing the label off his beer bottle. “She whined and griped about it. After hours of that shit, I got bored. Told her she’d do as she’s told, or she could go back to—” He cuts off, breathing out hard. It’s not quite a sob, but it’s close enough to hurt.

 _“Fuck,_ Len. You didn’t.” Mick shakes his head. “Don’t know which of you’s worse.”

His partner has gone unnaturally still, for him. No fidgeting fingers, no tapping feet. “What am I even doing, Mick? I’m a shitty brother and a shittier guardian. She deserves better parenting than this.” He sighs, his whole body slumping against the railings. “She’d be better off in the foster system. Or maybe she really would be better off with—”

Mick crowds into his space, raising a finger. “Don’t say it. Don’t you fucking dare.” Len’s head snaps right to stare at him. “Is this a good situation for her? Probably not. But I see you do right by that kid all the time. She’s got a brother who loves her, and that’s better than being alone. And it’s sure as hell better than being with your waste-of-space father who used to knock you both around with broken fucking bottles.”

Len’s quiet for a long time after Mick’s little speech, staring down to the street below. Mick doesn’t know when his partner took the weight of the world on his shoulders. When they met, Len was all about surviving. Somewhere along the way, he decided he was responsible for everyone else, and pushed himself to the bottom of the priority list. No matter what he might say otherwise.

He lays a too-gentle hand on Len’s shoulder. “C’mon. Let’s get some sleep. We’ll figure this all out in the morning.”

Len takes Mick’s hand and lets him help him up. He leans into him, till Mick’s damn near carrying him to bed. He asks, “We’ll find her, right, Mick?” in a broken murmur.

If he keeps that up, he’s going to break Mick’s heart. He sounds too much like the kid Mick knew in juvie - bluster and swagger all day long, and only laying his heart bare in the middle of the night, from the bunk above Mick, when he didn’t have to look him in the eye.

“Yeah, buddy,” he says, patting Len on the shoulder. “We’ll find her.”

* * *

For two more days, they don’t. 

Len spends half that time wallowing in guilt, the rest of it out searching for her. From the way he’s slumped over his coffee in the mornings, Mick doesn’t think he’s slept at all since she disappeared.

On the third evening after Lisa’s disappearance, Mick is fixing some hot chocolate when the door bangs open, and he looks up in time to catch Len storming in. Mick barely has time to ask, “Did you—?” before Len screws up his face and flicks an enraged thumb behind him.

“Ask her,” he snaps, and disappears towards his room.

Mick blinks at the perfectly healthy-looking Lisa Snart slinking in through the doorway like she’s hoping he won’t notice her.

Sighing, he takes a minute to look her up and down, to make absolutely sure she isn’t obviously bleeding. Then he points at the seat next to him at the table. “Sit,” he orders, emphasising the final T, in a good impression of Len.

Lisa rolls her eyes and sits down.

One of them has to be first to break the long, strained silence, so it might as well be Mick. “You hungry?”

She shakes her head. Her hands run back and forth along the edge of the table. “I ate at Sasha’s.”

“Sasha’s.” Mick can hear the disappointment echoing in his own voice. “Len called Sasha.” Lisa won’t meet his eyes. “I get that you wanted out for a while, Lise. But you couldn’t have answered one phone call from your terrified brother?” He flings his arm behind him, hard, towards the bedroom where Len’s disappeared to. “He’s been out of his fucking mind!”

He barely even raises his voice, but Lisa flinches.

Mick sighs. He does what he used to do around the Snarts years ago, and sets his hands flat on the table, where she can see them. “Talk to me, Lise.”

She’s unnaturally still, staring at the table. “He said he was gonna send me back.”

Mick can feel his mouth twisting. “Yeah, and I told him that was a shitty thing to say. If he don’t apologize to you, I’m gonna make it even clearer how I feel about that.” 

Lisa chokes on a bit of a laugh. “Good luck getting _him_ to apologize for anything.” She glances up at Mick, biting a lip. “I’ll tell him I’m sorry for running away.”

“Just him, huh?” Mick aims an unimpressed look at her. “Who d’you think trailed after him searching for you all night? Who d’you think was looking after him when he was losing the plot worrying about you? Who else d’you think was worried sick about you, Lise?”

She’s quiet for a minute - just keeps running her hands up and down the table, so much like her brother that it’s almost funny. Mick stares at her till she looks up, guilt in her eyes. She gets to her feet, shuffles over and throws her arms around him. “Sorry, Mick,” she murmurs. Then she pulls back and kisses him on the cheek.

While Mick’s blinking at her, she turns around, heading for the bedrooms. Glaring in Len’s general direction all the way.

And Mick needs to know they’re not killing each other, okay? That’s the reason he tiptoes out into the hallway, when he hears Lisa close the door to Len’s room, and hovers outside.

* * *

“Come in,” Lenny’s voice says through his closed door, and Lisa only pauses for a minute. _It’s just Lenny._ No matter how pissed off she’s made him.

He’s standing by the window, silhouetted in the evening sunshine. Then he turns around, and— okay, that’s not good. Between the bags under his bloodshot eyes and the sickly color in his face, he looks like he hasn’t eaten or slept in the past three days.

She is _not_ going to feel guilty about that. This was all his fault.

...Mostly his fault.

Lisa can hear someone shuffling about outside. Damn it, Mick. Now she’s going to have to apologize properly, or he’ll know. 

Lenny is staring at her. “Did you want something?” he asks in a tight drawl. 

She takes a step towards him. “Look, I—” 

His eyes flash with a hard, cold look.

She steps back.

He sighs, shoulders slumping. There’s something defeated in his face, like all the fight’s gone out of him. 

Lisa thinks back to what they both said in that ear-splitting argument, just before she walked out. She shouldn’t have said what she did, either. There are lines they don’t cross, him and her. 

Her brother is watching her with a wary, skittish look. She wonders who he’s afraid of. He says, “You should have told me where you were.”

Lisa sits down on the bed. “Yeah.” She runs her fingers along the shiny edge of the blanket. The little fire of rage is sparking inside her again. “Well, you shouldn’t have said— that.” He told her he’d _send her back._ There’s a flash of fear behind her fury. She smothers it down. 

Lenny drops down to the bed beside her. She can’t stand how sad he looks. “I know,” he says, very quietly.

She sniffles. “I hate you.”

His eyes go distant. “Kinda hate myself, so that’s convenient.”

“Yeah, well. You should…” She reaches up to wipe at her eyes. Great, now she’s crying. How embarrassing. Especially when her brother wraps his arms around her. “I’m sorry,” she manages to get out, forgetting for a minute that Snarts don’t apologize. 

Her brother has forgotten as well, apparently. “Me too.” 

(A minute or so later, much too quietly for anyone _listening outside_ to hear, Lisa murmurs, “Would you really send me back?”

There’s a short, painful pause, before Lenny holds her tighter and whispers, “Hell, no. Never.”)

Lisa wipes at her eyes some more as she pulls away - they will never speak of this again - and raises her voice. “Hey, bozo. We know you’re listening.”

There’s a cough from outside. Lenny grins, raising an eyebrow at Lisa. “Gonna stand out there all night, Mick?”

A head appears round the door. “Chicken parmigiana for dinner,” Mick announces. “Come and get it in twenty minutes or I eat it all.”

As he ducks out again, Lisa says, “Huh. Think he ran away ‘cause I was crying?”

Lenny wrinkles his nose at her. “God, yeah. About to take a very long walk to Keystone for beer, myself.”

Lisa pokes him.

* * *

Mick leans back against the counter, trying not to grin at Lisa tucking right into a pile of chicken and veggies. It’s a trip, watching the Snarts eat, now that they’re willing to. Used to be they both seemed to want to stay as thin as rakes, but now they eat almost like normal people. If anything about these two could be called _normal._

“Not joining us?” Len asks. He’s always slower to approach a plate of food, poking it like it might bite back if he’s not careful, but soon enough he’s devouring his chicken too.

“In a minute,” Mick says, making a show of clattering dishes in the sink. No need to give away that he’s mostly just enjoying watching them eat his food. Safe, well-fed Snarts: mission accomplished.

“You’re eating like a fucking mouse,” Lisa drawls at her brother, in a fair impression of him. “You can have the whole meal if you want. _Imagine._ ”

Len rolls his eyes as dramatically as ever. “Don’t fucking swear, Lisa.”

“Hypocrite,” Lisa says through a mouthful of chicken.

“And don’t talk with your mouth full.”

She pulls a face at him. _“Mmm-mmm-mmmm.”_

“Mick, tell her to stop being a brat.”

Mick holds up his hands. “No way. I ain’t getting involved in this Snart nonsense.” He waves a finger between them. “You’re both freaks. Eat your dinner.”

Lisa pouts at him - she’s getting better at that every day. “Aww, come on, Mick. The dishes can wait. You made it, you should get to eat it.”

He sighs, but he could never refuse her anything, or her ridiculous brother. Grabbing a plate, Mick slides into a chair across from Lisa. 

“I’ll find a way to send you to Europe,” Len says, offhand, like he’s talking about his dinner.

“Oh. Thanks,” Lisa says, just as casually. 

But when Len’s not looking, she shoots her brother the kind of smile that Mick doesn’t see on her face much. That brother of hers might be a mess, but she loves him.

And when Lisa turns her attention back to her food, Len looks at her, and then at Mick, as though he can’t believe either of them puts up with him. The feeling’s definitely mutual.

Then there’s a peaceful silence that Mick gets to enjoy for an entire two minutes.

“Stop looking at me like that. Mick, he’s looking at me weird.”

“What did I do _now?”_

“You looked at me weird!”

As Lisa descends into incoherent screeching and Len drops his head on the table, Mick takes a bite of chicken - delicious, even if he does say so himself - and reflects that it’s nice to have everything back to normal. 

But not so nice that he doesn’t end up yelling, “Both of you shut the fuck up and _eat!”_

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to RetroactiveCon for excellent beta reading.
> 
> And thank you for reading! Comments are love ❤️


End file.
